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It had been a slow growth, like mine. We were both desperately clawing for a piece of the market and an ounce of respect. And we were both fighting stereotypes. Me, that any of my eventual success (oh, please let it happen!) would be attributed to my looks. Him, from business fed by (or bought by) his sugar daddy.
We didn’t care. We wanted this career. My motivations were almost strictly financial, his deep-seated in earning his father’s respect. I looked around the room. We weren’t special. There were hungry eyes everywhere, all with different stimuli behind them.
He tapped at the front of the flyer, where they’d hidden the price in 14-point font. “Look at this. Three million is way too high. At that price point, I’d be on the ocean or on OLT. And speaking of which…” He glanced around furtively, then pulled at my elbow, drawing me away from the crowd. “I need to talk to you about something.”
Our options for privacy were limited in the crowded home. By the time he’d led me through the sunroom and out onto the side deck, my curiosity had swelled. Closing the screen door behind us, he moved to the railing. “I have a lead for us.”
For us? I straightened in my coral wedge heels. I’d never worked a listing with Tim before, but his leads came straight from Fred’s Rolodex, which was literally dipped in solid gold.
“It’s an Olive Line Trail listing. They haven’t started interviewing brokers yet—aren’t even sure they want to list it yet. I already prepared a CMA, but this client…” He huffed out a breath. “Let’s just say my chiseled looks are wasted on him. While you…” He gestured down the length of my body, then shrugged, as if everything was clear.
“He likes women,” I clarified.
“According to Fred, he loves women. But he knew him back when he was single. He’s married now. Still… I want to put my best foot forward. And that foot looks better in four-inch stilettos versus Ferragamos. Got me?”
I gave a slow nod, processing the information. Olive Line Trail homes were a rarity. They were never available, and most had been squatted on by wealthy Miami families for the last three decades. It’d be a quick sale, one with multiple offers and a six-figure listing commission. He’d been wise to take our conversation outside. If any of the realtors knew of the potential, we’d be clawing through them just to reach the ivy-lined gate.
“What did the CMA come in at?”
“Three-point six million. But there hasn’t been an OLT sale in three years, so that’s using other comps in the area. You know what that street name is worth. I think it’ll fetch closer to four.”
Yep. If Olive Line Trail was a zip code, it was in the 90210 prestige range. I studied his perfectly enhanced features and tried to understand what he was offering me. A co-listing seemed like too much, given that all he needed was a pretty face to accompany his market analysis. “Okay… so you want me to go with you on the listing presentation?”
“No, I want you to handle the listing. Start to finish. Make the introductory call, secure the listing, and maintain it.”
I frowned. “You don’t want to co-list it?” That didn’t make any sense. Not when our future at Blanton & Rutledge lived and died with our sales stats. Our positions on the board determined everything from our parking spaces (or lack of) to our up rotation. He needed a four-million-dollar bump as badly as I did.
“I want to refer it to you.” He pitched back the glass of champagne and then placed it on the deck railing. “For a seventy percent referral fee.”
The halo floating above his head dimmed by half. A seventy percent referral fee was unheard of. Twenty-five percent was standard. Then again, no agent in their right mind would refer a listing on OLT. Not that we even had the listing. Right now, all we had was a lead. A lead that we believed to be secret, but who knew. Maybe this seller was blabbing his intentions all over town. Maybe we were one of a dozen realtors with a market analysis in hand, already mentally depositing their commission checks.
A four million dollar sale at a three percent listing commission. $120,000. I struggled to do the math on my cut of that. Giving seventy percent to Tim would cut it down to thirty-five thousand dollars, give or take. Our brokerage would take another thirty percent, but I’d still get at least twenty thousand dollars. Twenty thousand dollars in our bank account and a four million dollar jump in my sales tally for the year.
I couldn’t turn it down. I also didn’t understand why Tim was giving it to me. We could have co-listed it with a 70/30 split and he could have still gotten the sales stat bump. I verbalized the observation and he gave a short but firm shake of the head. “It’s yours. Honestly. I don’t need my name on it.”
